Madeley Primary School students were among more than 65,000 children Australia-wide who donned eye patches as pirates to raise funds for research into childhood brain cancer on Friday.

Madeley staff personalised their proceedings by organising a “brain freeze for brain cancer”, with a local ice cream manufacturer selling desserts to the students and the proceeds going to the fundraiser.

The national phenomenon known as Pirate Day Friday was inspired by nine-year-old Joondalup resident Conor Colgan.

In 2014, his father Nathan began the fundraiser at Francis Jordan Catholic School, which his son attended in Currambine, after Conor was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumour.

The resilient youngster continues to defy the odds in 2016, but treatment has left him with paralysis to half his face and blindness in his right eye. It is because of this that children wear eye patches on Pirate Day Friday.

The concept grew last year to raise more than $40,000 from 49 registered schools in WA.